Throughout this course I have gained a lot of knowledge and skills that will benefit my writing in the future. By writing in an array of styles and disciplines, I have been able to develop my writing ability. I have definitely become a more versatile writer and can identity which types of writing coincide with which writing style. Each assignment and blog post has taught me different ways to write, which I can use in future courses. I have been able to communicate my ideas into words more efficiently as the semester progressed through practice. Even on the papers I did not feel as confident about, I have been able to use them as criticism to fix and further better my writing.
The blog posts were definitely an important factor in the development of my writing. With each essay, the corresponding blog post would allow me to reflect on my work. I was also able to understand the concepts in a deeper sense, as we would have to analyze something related to the prompt. From this, I was able to further understand different writing styles and thoroughly think about the rhetoric in which I need to write for the specific discipline. With metacognitive assignments I could pay attention to my writing more efficiently because I was actively thinking about the specific style choices I was making. I could focus on what I needed to include in order to fulfill the message I was trying to provide for the audience. With the blog, looking at different forms of media helped me to look at writings through different perspectives, further making my writing ability more versatile.
Looking back at the course and assignments I have completed, I have learned my personal writing style. I have learned a lot more about efficient time management, as we had to complete a few longer papers. Typically I procrastinate, which has been a weakness of mine, but I have been able to push myself and work hard to no longer wait until the last minute. I have found that, personally, what works best is to write an entire paper in one sitting, rather than breaking it up over the course of a few days. By no longer procrastinating, the extra time I have allows me to make revisions, especially after taking a step away from the essay and coming back with a fresh mindset to fix any errors I may have missed. I have also noticed that i can be repetitive with my writing sometimes, so focusing on in depth revisions has helped me fix this issue as I read my writing over.
There are a few writing assignments I really liked, as well as a few I struggled with. I found the first paper, the natural science, very difficult, as I was not used to writing a science based paper. It was also the very first paper of the semester, so I was not exactly sure what to expect. It was slightly challenging to comprehend my source in depth, which made it harder to convert to a popular adaptation. The science jargon was somewhat confusing for me and made it harder to understand the overall findings of the research as well. Although I did not do the best on this paper I learned a lot from it, which further helped my writing skills on later papers because I could identify specific errors I had made to avoid later on. I was able to fix the formatting of my writing style in regards to an effective introduction and conclusion. I also learned to write a better conclusion that went in depth and tied the entire essay back together, which benefited me on the other papers.
Overall, from the beginning of the semester to now, I have noticed an improvement in my writing style. I have utilized the advice that it is unnecessary to follow the common five paragraph format, which made my writing flow better as I strayed away from it. This in turn has helped me organize my thoughts more efficiently based on the discipline I am writing for. By writing many different styles of essays, I also have recognized my personal voice as a writing, instead of trying to stick to what I believed I should have sounded like. I now pay more attention to the way I write and try to listen to criticism more in depth in order to improve my paper, as I have recognized errors from an outside perspective. I will take these skills I have learned into future classes and my career, as I am in a social science major, therefore will be writing many papers throughout my college career.